10 years ago today, I graduated from McKinley High School.
(this year's graduating class from McKinley will graduate tomorrow)
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1) the day itself!
We were supposed to be in the school's auditorium at 3pm for our last rehearsal, and a moving speech from some of the staff!
Then at 5pm, we walked out of the Administration Building and on to the bleachers!
If you never have seen the lawn in front of McKinley's Administration Building, it is BEAUTIFUL!
Seeing the crowd from the bleachers makes it much more special!
Then there's the speeches about our past, present, and future, and we sang graduation related songs!
Then came the special moments!
The turning of the tassels!
Yelling out "99!" and "TIGER PRIDE" as a group!
And the ultimate --- walking through the oval!
For those who don't know, there is an oval in front of the school's Administration Building, with William McKinley's statue on it!
NOBODY is supposed to walk on the oval! You're supposed to walk around the oval! ALWAYS!
But there is ONE exception!
Graduation time!
After all the speeches, songs and ceremonies, the graduates walk through the oval (once in a lifetime moment) and on to the lawn to meet proud relatives!
When I got off the oval, my dad gave me the graduation ring! A really special moment!
Afterwards, I got leis from relatives and had to take photos with relatives! I thought my relatives took too long with photos because what I really wanted to do was walk around the big lawn to meet & greet fellow graduates and other people associated with the school!
Unfortunately, I didn't have a camera to take pictures with my graduates on the lawn! ( I did so for my college graduation, but that's a different subject)
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2) Then came time for Project Graduation!
Project Graduation is an all-night party sponsored by the school for the new graduates! It is supposed to be the last time we spend time together before we go on with our lives! It is also meant to give the new graduates a drug-free, alcohol-free celebration!
I question the sanity of anyone who doesn't go to their Project Graduation if one is provided by the school! You only got one chance and that it! If you didn't go, you really missed out!
And it's cheaper if you apply early!
Anyways, back to the story!
We meet at the cafeteria and we wait for our bus! The location was top secret! We were supposed to find out when we get there!
It was at a hotel in Waikiki!
We first had our dinner! There were conversations, but I latter told My friend Russell that we needed more excitement! BUT THAT WAS JUST THE BEGINNING!
We had a hypnosis show! We saw Julius V. hypnotized into dancing like Micheal Jackson and Jessilyn V. hypnotized into dancing like Madonna! While I'm skeptical about the whole hypnosis thing, it was still an exciting thing to watch! You really had to be there to enjoy it!
Then we had Pure Heart performing!
THEN THE FUN REALLY ABOUT TO START!
We had the dance floor open, we had the karaoke room open! I was known as the talent show guy that year, and I felt like I was in heaven with those things going on!
I was going back & forth between the dance floor and the karaoke room! Dancing, singing, rapping, having fun! And I just graduated! ONE OF THE MOST EXCITING MOMENTS IN MY LIFE!
As the night went on, some of our fellow graduates were falling asleep on the chairs! It was funny to see!
I was dancing on the stage even when others were too tired! One graduate who I didn't get a chance to know during the school years gave me a high-five when I was one of the last on the stage!
Then we had our breakfast when night turned into morning!
Then we got our official diplomas!
Then we got into the bus back to campus, for our parents to pick us up and go home!
Then I finally went to sleep in the morning after one of the funnest night of my life!
If you chose not to go, I question your sanity!
It's not like the prom where you gotta dress nicely, gotta have a date, gotta come in style! At Project Grad, you just come and show up and have fun! You earned it!
3) My high school years!
If you go to a school with 1,800 students, you aren't going to get along with everyone! It's statistically impossible! You or someone will sooner or later say the wrong thing and things can happen and they do!
However, I think most of my experiences @ McKinley was positive!
It is in the greatest location in Hawaii, right in the center of Honolulu!
It's near Ala Moana, Ward Center (though it wasn't as developed in my days as it is now), downtown, Tower Records (unfortunately gone since the development of mp3s), and downtown (the center of business and government of Hawaii)!
It's hard not to feel arrogant about how great our school's location is!
My greatest classes were taught by Mr. Newkirk (9th grade English), Mr. Chee (11th grade - geometry), Ms. Tamura (12th grade - social studies), Mr. Sekiguchi (12th grade - Algebra II), Ms. Chun (10th grade - computer class)!
I also like Agriculture class, though I didn't like it when the teacher slapped my classmate's head for not understanding what he was trying to explain! However, most of the classmates were fun people and it was a cruise class!
PE classes @ McKinley was WAY BETTER than PE classes at my middle school! McKinley's program was more of a New School style program where you had more options to pick from in physical activities, whereas my middle school was stuck in the old school mentality where it's "you only play certain sports and if you suck, too bad! "
The weight training class was fun, except for the 2 fake gangsters in one semester!
4) What I liked best about high school
-- hanging out by shop building in my Junior Year, with Russell Siu, Orlando Holbron, Justin Gonda, Brian Anderson, and a few other occasional guests! It was a racially diverse group of guys but we always had fun!
Too bad they all couldn't get along afterward! I haven't seen some of them in a while, but I missed hanging out with them!
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Pep rallies
if you can yell, it is the greatest activity! you don't have to be physically fit or super-intelligent! You just yell when it's your class' turn!
I even shocked some people who only saw my more quiet, serious side in class!
I want to do it again!
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Bonfires
It was the Homecoming activity, with the bonfire, music, food, and excitement!
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Talent shows
I didn't start until my senior year, but they were legendary!
I shocked the school when I sang Usher's "Nice & Slow" at the Senior Luau! No one saw it coming, not even my closest friends!
But my favorite performance was the 2nd one, at Brown Bags (which changed its format since then)! I sang Nate Dogg's "Never Leave Me Alone".
It made me a star at the school!
Too bad it was before the YouTube era!
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The re-opening of the Administration Building
The building was about to start renovations when I entered high school!
It was completed in the middle of my Junior Year!
It was nice, fresh and clean!
Walking the hall brought school pride!
It was legendary!
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The campus clubs
I was part of the fishing, Drug-Free, Leo, Martial Arts, and Spanish Clubs.
I got to meet new people, went to various activities, and had fun!
5) entering the school
before high school, I was at Liliuokalani Elementary (preschool-kindergarten), Lanakila Elementary (1st to 5th grade) and Kawananakoa Middle (back then it was called "intermediate school" but I liked the sound of "middle school" better)
My brother graduated before I entered the school, so I kind of had an idea about the school from his yearbooks!
But I was also warned about McKinley from middle school classmates, who mentioned about the fights between Samoans and Vietnamese @ McKinley the year before I entered!
My middle school, Kawananakoa was split between 2 high school districts - McKinley (who had the more immigrant, ghetto population) and Roosevelt (with a more upper-class population mixed mostly with local Japanese and Native Hawaiians)!
While I got along with some Roosevelt-bound peers, my closest friends were going to McKinley! I also felt a portion of the Roosevelt-bound peers were elitist snobs! With a few exceptions, I was more closer to the McKinley-bound peers!
Entering high school, we were mixed with those from Central Middle School (with a reputation of having an immigrant, low-income housing population) and Washington Middle School (which split between McKinley and Kaimuki High School, mixed-income but mostly urbanized middle class)
It was interesting to meet people from the 2 differing schools as well as some from schools outside the district!
While some local people didn't like being at the most immigrant high school in Hawaii, I thought it made the school much more interesting! I always loved diversity!
It was also interesting to see Pacific Islanders and Asian immigrants embracing the West Coast gangsta rap trend that was popular in 1995 when I entered high school!
While most students embraced hip-hop, other styles like ska, reggae, rave, punk rock, and heavy metal had fans amongst our peers!
6) Conclusion
There's much more that can be said about my time in high school.
I gotta go now, but I might even add stuff to this blog post if it's important!
